Treated chimes collide with broken beats, and the resultant debris dissolves in decay, while serene synthesized strings rise in surrounding warm swells. Drum patterns are pitched down to a crawl, and Melbourne / Naarm-based Phoebe Dubar, aka I Keep Seeing Rainbows Everywhere, adds heavenly, angelic harmonies, and a haunting viola ache. Sharing production duties with Seattle’s Christian Gunning, aka Shelf Nunny, their An Open Book is a 6-track E.P., of short, emotional avant-pop.

Not Lo-Fi, but loose arrangements of whispered lyrics, hang, handpan-like scales, accompanying overtones, and filtered, off-kilter funky breaks. Grainy glitch deep in its sound design. Atmospheres, digitally stuttered, and seizure-d, where electric and acoustic guitar virtuosity is made up for by reverb and delay. Night Walk exudes, gentle, everyday heartbreak. Not the type of disappointment that forces you to give up, and stop, but the small kind that still takes your breath away. Sleepy Day soundtracks the sort of memories, missed, messed up, opportunities that we keep moving to try to avoid thinking about. Break-ups that leave us bruised. Low but not out. You Don’t Have To Go is also all tangled. Romance’s riddle still captivating us enough to foolishly attempt to unravel its knot. 

Shelf Nunny X IKSRE’s An Open Book is out now on Washington’s Hush Hush.